Indigenous youth bring the spirit of northern life to Algonquin College campus

The Mamidosewin Centre hosted a morning of northern folklore, fun and fascination earlier this month, as Indigenous students from Nunavut and Northwest Territories made the trip down to Algonquin College to present a showcase of life in the tundra.

Designed by The Northern Youth Abroad Program, the trip gave them an opportunity to travel, learn and share their stories. Hailey Basil-Grandejambe and June Sanspariel from Northwest Territories, and Ernie Lyall, Latisha Porter and Cadence Okalik from Nunavut spoke about their daily adventures living in their Indigenous communities, accompanied by pictures of the native northern lifestyle.

Lyall, 20, began the presentation describing the animals native to his arctic hometown, Taloyoak, Nvt. His pictures revealed musk oxen, wolves, polar bears, caribou, Canadian geese, beluga whales, bowhead whales and ringed seals.

“My dad and me go hunting for caribou or musk ox, which we eat. Some of us, we hunt wolves too, but we don’t eat them, we just use their fur,” said Lyall.

Hunting in the Arctic requires patience, and that’s where the knowledge from elders in the community is invaluable. Young Inuit like Lyall offer their catch to the elders first, to show gratitude.

“When I go fishing with my dad, we can catch around 200 fish, and that takes about ten hours,” said Lyall. “We use a rifle or a harpoon to catch seals in the winter. But you have to be very quiet and careful. Even the slightest sound of you walking on the snow can scare them.”

Cadence Okalik, a 19-year-old from Whale Cove, Nvt., giggled as she revealed how small her community is – just 470 to 500 people.

“I like to eat beluga whale meat,” Okalik said. “It’s a little chewy. You can eat it raw, bake it, boil it or dry it.”

She then passed around artifacts for the audience to get a closer glimpse of Inuit culture- a narwhal tusk and elegant soapstone sculptures of a seal and an Inukshuk that she had crafted in school.

“Inukshuk means in the likeness of a human, in English. Inukshuks are used as navigation tools for marking, hunting or for fishing locations. They also indicate places of memorials,” said Okalik.

Following the presentation, everyone gathered at the Mamidosewin Centre had a chance to watch and participate in traditional Inuit games with the team.

One game involved taking a run-up and kicking a ball that was suspended at a height with a rope. With each successful kick, the height of the ball is increased and the highest kicker wins the game. But here’s the catch. The kicker has to land on the same leg they use to kick the ball.

“There’s a man in my hometown who can kick 13 feet!” said Okalik.

Another traditional game, the Inuit leg-wrestle, involved two people lying down, parallel to each other, with their heads on opposite sides. They locked their arms at the elbow for stability. Then, each wrestler lifted one leg to tug at the opponent’s leg and they tried to flip each other over.

Porter and Okalik also went head-to-head in musk ox wrestling as shown in this YouTube video.

An enduring theme that shone throughout the presentation was the connection to the land and the reverence for the forces of nature that are at the core of northern Indigenous cultures.

Lyall spoke about Sedna, the Inuit goddess of the sea, who governs over the animals that are essential for survival in the Arctic.

“In Nunavut, there is a saying that if we are harming our land, she won’t give us animals, but if we’re protecting our land, she’s going to give us more catches,” said Lyall.